


Not Today

by littlelamplight



Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: F/F, another season final fix it, season 4 speculation, spoilers for season final
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-11
Updated: 2015-07-12
Packaged: 2018-04-08 18:16:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4315368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlelamplight/pseuds/littlelamplight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What do we say to death?</p><p> </p><p>In which Delphine lives, and the sestras go to war.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

 

She can hear her heartbeat in her ears. She can feel the warmth of her blood slipping between her fingers. She'd pealed off her gloves and pressed them to her wound in a half hearted attempt to stop the bleeding, but she knows its useless. 

 

The world fades in and out. 

 

She’s alone in the garage, and she’s going to die alone. 

 

She’s become so used to fighting for Cosima and her sisters that she’s forgotten how hard it is to fight for herself. 

 

She wants to live. Because Cosima is still in danger, she’s now in terrible, terrible danger, and she has to warn her. She knew something like this was coming, she’d expected that someone would come for her, but she hadn’t realised that she’d be leaving Cosima so endangered, so unsafe. 

 

But she can’t do anything. 

 

Her phone rings. Blearily, her hand shaking, her arm heavy, she reaches for it. There is blood on her fingers, and she thinks absently that she’ll never be able to get it out of the groves in her phone, and then remembers that she’s going to die here anyway, so it doesn’t matter. 

 

 _‘Hey Delphine, is this a bad time?’_ Cosima’s voice washes over her, and Delphine closes her eyes, her breathing ragged. She thinks it's fitting that Cosima's will be the last voice she hears. 

 

 _‘Delphine?’_ and now Cosima sounds worried, and Delphine wonders if she can hear how difficult it is to breathe steadily.  _‘Delphine, what’s wrong? What’s going on? Are you okay?’_

 

‘I love you, Cosima’. She can’t help the words that leave her, but she wishes she hadn’t said it. It’ll make it harder, for Cosima, now. 

 

‘ _I know, that’s why I rang, I - ’_

 

‘There is not… much time’, her breath hitches, and she cannot stop the pained sound that escapes her throat. She feels cold, and wonders, absently, why she isn’t dead yet. ‘You are in danger…’ the world goes black for a single moment, but Delphine fights it. 

 

And now Cosima sounds terrified.  _‘Delphine, what’s wrong? Are you injured? Where are you?’_

 

‘I tried to protect you. I failed. Don’t trust anyone but your family, and I mean that, please…’ another shuddering breath, another moan, ‘please, Cosima’. She doesn’t know what she’s asking for anymore.

 

 _‘Delphine’,_ she’s never heard Cosima sound so terrified, her voice a forced calm that doesn’t hide anything,  _‘what’s happened? Where are you? Tell me where you are’._

 

‘They’ve killed me, _mon cœur’,_ she cannot help the term of affection, and maybe she made a mistake, calling Cosima, maybe she should’ve called Sarah, ‘they shot me’. She cannot help the note of terror in her own voice, and hates herself for it. ‘I’m sorry, but I cannot take care of your sisters anymore. I’m sorry I have failed’. 

 

 _‘Delphine’,_ and now Cosima's voice is strong, strong and wavering and desperate, ‘ _don’t you dare die on me, okay? It's going to be okay. Just tell me where you are. Please.’_ It's the pleading that unravels her, just as always, and she doesn't have the strength to resist. 

 

Delphine sighs quietly. She feels numb. ‘I’m in… the parking lot… of my apartments. It’s too late, Cosima’, she can hear movement on the other end now, voices shouting to each other, Sarah’s distinctive voice, ‘don’t come here. It’s not safe’. 

 

‘ _Delphine’_ , Cosima’s breath hitches, and Delphine’s heart aches.  _‘I love you too. I am not letting you die’._

 

Delphine’s eyes burn. ‘I’m sorry for hurting you, Cosima. I wish there had been another…’ she can’t see very well anymore, and she doesn’t know if its because she’s dying, or because she’s crying. ‘I… they threatened you… and I… I couldn’t put you in that danger… I… I couldn’t help save your sisters if I couldn't… act’. She sucks in a ragged breath, and her grip on reality is breaking, its getting harder and harder to speak, harder to breath, harder to keep the phone to her head. ‘They told me that I’d always be a risk to you… and I couldn’t… let you get into a situation… where you’d have to choose…’ She’s exhausted, and she can’t say anymore. Her tongue feels heavy. Everything feels heavy. 

 

 _‘Delphine’,_ Cosima's voice catches on a sob, and Delphine’s tears are falling thickly now, ‘ _why didn’t you tell me?’_

 

She’s staring at Cosima across from her, her heart breaking to pieces, and she feels like there is a gulf between them that would be all too easy to breach. 

 

_Why didn’t you tell me?_

 

_You don’t believe in stuff like that._

 

‘I needed to protect you. I needed to make sure you lived’. 

 

Silence. Then, ‘ _you want to make sure I live? Don’t die on me, okay?’_

 

She’s slipping. ‘ _D’accord, mon amour_ ’. 

 

_‘I love you, Delphine. And I’m going to save you’._

 

The words repeat over and over again, and she doesn’t know if its just in her head, or whether its real, and then she doesn’t know anything anymore. 

 

 

 

~~~~~~

 

 

 

She dreams of Cosima’s laugh, of the way her eyes light up and her head tilts back. 

 

She dreams that Cosima is holding her hand, and begging with her to stay, not to leave, because she loves her. She wants to, god she does, but she’s a danger to her, to them all, and its easier (its harder) to turn away. 

 

She dreams that there are hands on her face, and frantic voices, and Cosima’s face flickers and becomes Sarah’s, panicked and terrified, _hold on Delphine_ , her face flickers and becomes Cosima’s, _don’t you dare die on me,_ and she sees Felix’s face in her peripheral vision, she sees an older woman arguing with a strange man, she sees white walls and flickering lights, and she sees Cosima’s face again, _I love you, I love you, you can’t die_ , and she wants to reach out and touch her face, but its a dream, its just a dream, and she can’t touch her. 

 

 _Come back to me_. 

 

She tries. 

 

 

 

~~~~~~

 

 

 

Sarah feels like she’s failed. She knows its a stupid, stupid feeling, because she can’t save everyone, but she felt something break when she watched Cosima beg with the woman she loved over the phone, clutching at Felix as if she was going to fall, not to die, just _please don’t die_. 

 

And she feels like they should’ve done more to protect the woman who has spent so long protecting them. 

 

She’d spent so long distrusting Delphine that when she broke Cosima’s heart, it was easy to pretend that it was because she wanted Rachel’s position, easy to pretend it was because she was a bitch. 

 

She should’ve known better. She did know better. 

 

She knew, without having to hear it, that Delphine broke her own heart in the process. She knows what heartbreak looks like on someone, and when Delphine found her at the lake that time, she could see it in her eyes, before she’d even done it.

 

And now she knows the truth, they all know the truth, because when Delphine stopped talking on the phone, Cosima turned to them and told them what had happened, told them what had been said, that Delphine has been trying and trying to protect them, and it had cost her her happiness, and now it might cost her her life, and Siobhan had jerked the car down a side street and hit the gas, and Sarah thinks it's a miracle that they didn’t die on the way here. 

 

People keep getting hurt because of them, and because they need to protect each other. But Delphine should’ve been a part of that. She should’ve been at that dinner. She’s done so much for them, and they’ve accomplished so much because of her, and now, now she might die because she lost so much blood, and was willing to die for them. 

 

She doesn’t voice any of this. She sits beside Cosima, a hand in hers, Felix wrapping an arm around the shaking woman, and waits. 

 

Its a good that Siobhan’s connections extended to this private hospital, she thinks, because if they were somewhere public, they’d be too easy to find. Someone will come back when they realise that Delphine isn’t dead in a parking garage. 

 

They’re safe for now, with Delphine being treated, unregistered thanks to Siobhan. There are no cameras here. They have time, and that time might just be enough to save Delphine’s life. 

 

It bloody well better be. 


	2. Chapter 2

‘What do we do, S?’ Cosima can hear Sarah, Siobhan and Felix talking near by, but she doesn’t really care what they’re saying. 

 

Delphine is alive. 

 

(For now).

 

She sits on the hospital bed, as close as she can to the woman, and combs her fingers through her soft hair. There was blood in her hair when they found her, staining it the same colour as the pavement around her, as the car behind her, as her hands, and god, they’re had been so much blood. She lost so much blood. But the doctors cleaned her up, and now that her hair is drying, its beginning to curl. 

 

She feels her heart in her mouth. God, she nearly died. She nearly lost her, just when things felt like they were settling down, just when things felt like they were going back to normal. She’d thought that maybe they did have a chance, despite everything that had happened, because when Delphine had kissed her outside that store with her family waiting for them, she’d felt whole again. 

 

She feels awful. 

 

She remembers the way Delphine’s expression had broken apart when she’d told her she understood why she’d done what she had, and that she was sorry. She remembers the hope that she’d seen there, the relief, and in that moment, Delphine had looked like she remembered her. 

 

She’d called her because there was something very, very final about that kiss. About that whole interaction. She’d felt like maybe it was a beginning, maybe things would be fine, maybe they could go back to loving each other without having to pretend otherwise. But when Delphine’s car had driven away and she’d sat down at the table again, she’d remembered the way Delphine had looked at her, the way she’d bitten her lip and the brightness in her eyes, as if she’d been trying, desperately, to hold herself back, but she couldn’t. And later, Cosima sat there at the dinner table, and realised that something was terribly, terribly wrong. 

 

She’ll never forget the way Delphine sounded as the life bleed out of her. 

 

And now that she is alive, she’s not going to loose her. In every sense of the word. 

 

She leans forward until her lips are pressed against Delphine’s temple, and whispers, ‘stay with me Delphine, please. I need you’. 

 

There is no response. Her throat closes over, and she takes a shuddering breath. Everything will be okay. It has to be. 

 

‘How long do you think we have, before they start looking?’ asks Sarah, anxious and concerned, a hint of panic behind it all. She imagines that Sarah probably feels very exposed here. Not surprisingly, the other woman doesn't trust hospitals, not after what happened with Kira. 

 

‘Not long. But we’ll be safe here, even after that. They won’t find us here, even if they check all the private hospitals’.

 

‘You trust that man?’ 

 

‘Delphine told me not to trust anyone but our family’. She feels all eyes turn to her, and faces them. ‘We stay until she’s better, until she can move, and then we need to get her to safety’. 

 

‘And where would we go?’ asks Felix, rubbing at his jaw anxiously. ‘We can’t exactly keep her with us. This isn’t like giving Helena to Alison. They want her dead. They tried to kill her’.

 

‘Jesus bloody Christ’. Sarah runs a hand through her hair. ‘We need help. We need someone in Topside or... _something_ ’. Sarah is now beginning to realise how much she'd unconsciously relied on Delphine and her position at DYAD now. They don't have anyone that can help them from there anymore. 

 

‘Call Ferdinand’. Cosima hears her own voice without registering that she’s spoken. ‘You said that he hates Neolutionists, right?’

 

‘You want to trust him? Cosima, thats a bad idea, you know that’.

 

‘If they think she’s dead, they’re less likely to come looking’.

 

‘And if theres no body, they won’t believe it. What do you want to do, kill someone?’ 

 

Cosima stays silent. She feels like she could, right now. 

 

‘No, no. We can’t trust Ferdinand, at least not yet. If it comes to that… then maybe’. Siobhan sounds tired, and cautious. 

 

There is a pause. Then, ‘what about Marion Bowles? She’s helped us before, right? She’s invested. She made Delphine take charge of Rachel’s duties’. Sarah looks around at them all, biting her lip. ‘Its worth a shot, right?’

 

There is a pause. ‘Do you even know how to contact her?’ Felix looks worried, he looks anxious, like he’s not sure what to do.

 

Sarah hesitates. ‘Cos, do you still have Delphine’s phone?’

 

Cosima rummages in her pocket, her fingers stiff and numb. She doesn’t feel connected to what’s happening. Her thoughts are a whirl, leaping from one moment with Delphine to the next, from the woman’s promise to love all her sisters, to the touch of her lips, to the way she looks in the early morning, hair a halo of gold splayed out on the pillow. 

 

She finds it, and she unlocks it, and hands it over without a word, feeling a little tug at her heartstrings when she realises a moment later that the woman still hasn’t changed her password. She swallows tightly, and tries to focus on anything but the burning behind her eyes. 

 

Sarah takes Delphine’s phone, handling it gingerly. There is dried blood caked into the groves of the woman’s phone, and Sarah tries not to think about the way the woman came so close to bleeding out, alone in a parking garage. She tries not to think about the fact that, even at the end, she was focused on trying to help Cosima and her sisters. 

 

‘Yeah’, she says after a moment, ‘got it’. She bites her lip anxiously, glancing around at the other three. 

 

Siobhan hesitates, but Cosima cuts across her, her voice low and surprisingly strong. ‘Do it’. 

 

Sarah hits call, and waits. The phone keeps ringing, and she feels a prickle of apprehension. Marion doesn’t feel like someone to not answer her phone, especially if she suspects its important. She doubts that Marion and Delphine do social calls. 

 

After what feels like ages, the phone picks up.  _‘Delphine my dear, what can I do for you?_

 

Sarah frowns slightly. Marion sounds strained and exhausted, and strangely, like she’s been crying. She shakes herself. It must be her imagination. ‘Its Sarah’. 

 

There is a surprised silence. ‘ _Sarah Manning, well this is an unexpected surprise. What can I do for you?’_

 

‘We need help. We’ve got a bit of a situation here’. 

 

_‘I gathered’._ There is a pause. _‘You’re not the only one, I’m afraid. But tell me what you need’._

 

Sarah hesitates. They need to do this, but she still feels uneasy.  _‘You can talk freely, Sarah, this line is secure. I know trust is hard to come by, but I told you I’d help, remember?’_

 

She takes a deep breath.  _‘_ Someone tried to kill Delphine today. She’s alive, for now, but we need help keeping it that way’. 

 

There is another pause. Then, ‘ _the people who ordered her execution are very high up, Sarah. To protect her, you might need to start a war’._

 

Sarah takes a shaky breath, and glances over at Delphine, pale and still, Cosima’s head bowed near hers. ‘She fought one for us’. 

 

She hears a chuckle.  _‘Alright Sarah, I understand. I can help protect Delphine. I may even be able to help you stop Neolution, and end the threat to Delphine’s life entirely’._ There is a pause. ‘ _I’ve been waiting for this opportunity’._

 

She blinks. ‘You’ve been busy, haven’t you?’

 

Siobhan frowns at her, and mouths, _what’s happening?_

 

Sarah holds up a hand. ‘How would you do that?’

 

_‘First, you should know that Neolution is being run by Susan Duncan’._

 

Sarah runs a hand through her hair. ‘Shit. No one’s dead when you think they’re dead, are they’. 

 

Marion laughs shortly.  _‘It cost me a lot to find that out’,_ her voice catches, and again, Sarah feels unease curl in her stomach,  _‘she also managed to get Rachel here, though I’m not entirely sure how. I’ve been… complacent for some time now. They have leverage on me. But if you can stop this…’_ she clears her throat _, ‘you have to stop this. They know you have the original genome, and they’re not going to stop until they have it. They’ll do more experiments, and more people will die. This needs to end’._

 

Sarah feels like she’s standing on a precipice. She swallows. ‘And if we end this, then we’ll be safe? For good?'

 

_‘Its your best shot’._

 

‘Alright, what do we need to do? And what about Delphine?’

 

_‘I can organise something to buy you some time in terms of Delphine’s death. The best thing, until we do this, is for you to get her into a safe house’._ There is another pause.  _‘When I said you’d be starting a war… thats not exactly correct. War is already coming, straight to your doorstep. You’re going to want to protect your people. And I mean all your people’._

 

Sarah’s stomach feels like its in her throat. ‘Okay’, she says shakily. ‘And the rest?’

 

_‘You need to kill Susan Duncan’._

 

Sarah closes her eyes. She’s not exactly surprised. 

 

_‘But Sarah… if you want my help doing that part, in organising that for you, there’s something you need to do for me’._

 

She nearly laughs, and she can’t help but sound bitter. ‘I should’ve known that no one does anything out of charity. What happened to stopping them before its too late?’

 

_‘Sarah’,_ Marion’s voice cuts across her, and for the first time, it trembles, and Sarah realises how afraid she sounds, ‘ _they have Charlotte’._

 

_Fuck._  

 

 

 

~~~~~~

 

 

 

By the time Sarah is done talking to Marion, who hangs up with a promise to be in touch, she feels slightly numb, and very sick, and all the more grateful to Delphine. 

 

She wonders whether the woman knew just how dangerous these people are. Wonders if she knew the extent to which she was risking herself. 

 

She knows, without having asked, that she did. 

 

She repeats the conversation as best she can to Felix and Siobhan, and Cosima turns to listen with unseeing eyes. 

 

Marion left for Europe to meet with her people, people like Delphine and Paul, people invested, people with access to information. A resistance, of some kind, bent on bringing down Leda and Castor and now, Neolution. Marion's people, it turns out, are a lot more in number than Susan Duncan realised when she took Charlotte from her mother in an attempt to stop her. On the outside, Marion bowed her head, did what Susan said, and on the inside, her people kept working, she kept working, and Susan is apparently none the wiser. 

 

_She knows that I’d do anything for my daughter. She just doesn’t understand that that means doing what I have to to break her out before they start becoming too interested in her. She doesn’t understand that I will do anything to save my child from her and her people, and what they’re capable of._

 

Sarah remembers her surrender for Kira, and how it had felt like the only thing to do. Once, she might’ve thought that Marion was risking too much, that she was putting Charlotte’s life at risk, but she remembers watching Kira through a one way mirror, and understands exactly what the woman is doing. 

 

She runs a hand through her hair, watching her family process her words. 

 

‘Does she have a plan?’ Cosima’s expression has been an odd one for this entire conversation, smooth and calm, (except when she looks at Delphine, then, Sarah sees everything she remembers), but there is a fire brewing behind her eyes. 

 

‘Hold on, just slow done’, says Siobhan, her expression tight. ‘What if its a trap, Sarah? She seemed to know about Delphine’s attack. Delphine herself warned us not to trust anyone. If Neolution does have Charlotte, there’s a high possibility that this entire thing is a trap. That Marion has been forced to do this’. 

 

Sarah feels her hand tighten in her hair involuntarily. She had considered that. She really had. Because she remembers the way Marion looked at Charlotte, what feels like years ago, and now she remembers how she sounded, the way she pleaded, and she knows that its a possibility. 

 

Sarah, like her sisters, has been betrayed many times by people she allowed herself to trust. 

 

But right now, she’s not thinking about Marion, really. She’s thinking about Charlotte, the lone survivor of botched experiments, and the thought of her being harmed by these ruthless people. 

 

Maybe its time to stop running. 

 

‘What choice do we have, S? Look, lets see if she follows through with buying us some time, and then we’ll see’. Sarah lowers her voice. ‘But what if she’s telling the truth? What if a war is coming? We had no idea Neolution was in control. We thought they were this minor, unimportant organisation, and now we’ve found at that they’re at the heart of it all. What if… what if we can stop this? Once and for all? Be safe, finally?’

 

‘You really think killing one person will solve all of this?’

 

‘No I’m not a bloody idiot, but Marion said there were things she’s found. If Susan dies, the organisation will crumple. Her people, and then Topside, will take care of the rest’.

 

Siobhan is silent for a moment. ‘Alright, then. Again, does she have a plan?’

 

‘She said she’s in the process of refining the details. She said that meanwhile, we should make sure everyone is safe. But the general idea seems to be, get over there… take care of Susan Duncan, and blow up the facility. Her people will do that part. She needs me to get Charlotte out, and take care of Duncan’. 

 

‘You should take Helena. Let her deal with Duncan’. Felix sounds very tired, but there is a glint in his eye. He’s just as tired of all this as Sarah. 

 

Siobhan is silent for a moment. ‘You know that it won’t be so simple, don’t you love?'

 

‘I know, S’, Sarah sounds determined, ‘but I’m exhausted. I’m tired of shit getting thrown at us, again and again. What happens if war comes, and we have to send Kira away again? I can’t keep living away from my kid, sending her around the globe, hoping that one day it’ll be safe to bring her back, and not have to worry that some psycho will try and kill her’. She takes a deep breath. ‘Delphine told Cosima that they threatened to use Cosima against her, and vice versa. We can’t keep wondering whether we’re going to endanger each other. Its not like we can just sever connections, is it? What happens when they go for Alison’s kids? What happens if they go for Felix? We can’t live the rest of our lives either scared shitless, or in hiding. S, you know that this won’t end, unless we make it’. 

 

There is a pause. Cosima lifts her head, and turns to look at them. ‘Sarah’s right’. She thinks of Delphine, and all that she has done for them, and squeezes the woman’s hand. ‘I want to be with the woman I love, and she can’t, because she thinks it’ll put me in danger’. She looks at them all. ‘Is that anyway to live? Loving someone, and being afraid to?’

 

Siobhan sighs heavily. Then puts her hand on Sarah’s shoulder. ‘Whatever we do, we’re going to need a plan first. We’ll wait and see what details Marion can give us. If we’re going to war, we’re going to war, and I’m not going to let that happen unless we’re sure we can finish it’. 

 

Cosima looks down at Delphine, and watches the rise and fall of her chest for a moment. Her heart aches. 

 

‘We will’. 

 

They have to. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry not much Cophine moments here, but this stuff is necessary. I am literally trying to fix everything, so I hope I'm handling it okay. 
> 
> Is anyone else stumped by whats going on with Charlotte and Marion on the show?

**Author's Note:**

> Another season final fix it because I am in denial and this is helping me cope. This will span what could happen in season 4, basically.


End file.
